Benedict Cumberbatch has helped marry two of his friends at a gay wedding.

The Sherlock star officiated the civil ceremony in Ibiza at the weekend.

Benedict told New York magazine: "It's a very private, lovely thing to be asked to do. Of course, I'm going to make a joke after it, 'I do weddings. Next will be children's parties and bat mitzvahs,' if it goes well. It's a mainly Jewish and gay audience, so hopefully they will be lenient towards me."

The British actor, who turned 37 last week, also revealed he has finished his work as the voice of Smaug the dragon in The Hobbit and is about to begin filming the rest of the new series of Sherlock.

He said: "I just got the script, and it's another early birthday present, because it is amazing. I don't want to hype it too much, because we haven't made it yet, but what a script! Steven Moffat is brilliant.

"We shot the first two already, and then we had to break for Martin [Freeman] to do some pick-ups and things for The Hobbit, and for myself to do some Smaug-ing. That's all done now. So we're on Sherlock for four weeks, into early September. So it's a good time, I tell you. It's a very, very exciting time to be me. I'm really lucky."